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FOURTH OF JULY ORATION. I 



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ORATION 



PRONOUNCED BEFORE THE 



INHABITANTS OF BOSTON, 



JULY THE FOURTH, 1835, 



IN COMMEMORATION OF 



AMERICAN INDEPENDENCE. 



BY &£ORGE S. HILIiARD. 



BOSTON : 

PRESS OF JOHN H. EASTBURN, CITY PRINTER, 

1835. 



CITY OF BOSTON. 



In Common Council, July 4, 1835. 
Resolved, That the thanks of the City Council be presented to George S. 
IIiLLARD, for the appropriate and eloquent Oration this day delivered by him, 
in the name of the City, and that the Mayor be requested to ask of him a copy 
for the press. 

Sent up for concurrence, 

JOSIAII QUINCY, Jr. President. 



Read and Concurred, 

A TRUE Copy — Attest, 



In the Board of Alder men, July 7, 1S.35. 

THEODORE LYMAN, Jr. Mayor. 

S. F. McCLEARY, City Clerk. 



ORATION. 



It cannot be denied that we have been, for some time 
past, growing indifferent to the celebration of this day. It 
was once hailed — and some who hear me can remember the 
time — with emotions too deep for words. The full hearts of 
men overflowed in the copious, gushing tears of childhood, 
and silently went up to Heaven on the wings of praise. 
With their own sweat and their own blood, they had won 
their inheritance of peace, and they prized it accordingly. 
They were yet fresh from the great events which we read of 
as cold matters of history. The storm had passed by, but 
the swell of the troubled waters, rising in dark heaving ridges, 
yet marked its duration and violence. All things then wore 
the beauty of novelty, and long possession had not dulled the 
sense of enjoyment. The golden light and glittering dews 
of the morning were above and around them. The wine of 
life sparkled and foamed in its freshly poured cup. The lovely 
form of Liberty — to us so familiar — seemed like a bright 
vision, newly lighted upon this orb, from the starry courts of 
Heaven, and men hung with the rapture of lovers, upon her 
inspiring glances and her animating smiles. But a half centu- 
ry has rolled by and a new generation has sprung up, who 
seem to think that their social and political privileges belong 
to them as naturally as air and light, and reflect as little upon 
the way in which they came by them. The very magnitude 
of our blessings makes us insensible to their value, as the an- 
cients supposed that the music of the spheres could not be 



6 

heard, because it was so loud. The whole thing has become 
to us an old story. We have heard so much of the spirit of 
Seventy-six, and of the times that tried men's souls, that we 
are growing weary of the sound. The same feeling, which 
made the Athenians tired of hearing Aristides called the Just, 
makes us tired of hearing this called a glorious anniversary. 
But that man is little to be envied, who cannot disentangle this 
occasion from the secondary and debasing associations which 
cling to it — from its noise, its dust, its confusion, its dull 
orations and vapid toasts — and, ascending at once into a high- 
er region of thought and feeling, recognize the fuh, unimpair- 
ed force of that grand manifestation of moral power which- has 
Gonsecrated the day. \ cold indifference to this celebration, 
would, in itself, be a sign of ominous import to the fortunes 
of the republic. He, who greets the light of this morning 
with no throb of generous feeling, is unworthy of a share in 
that heritage of glory which he claims by right of the blood 
which flows in his degenerate veins. That man, had he hved 
sixty years ago, would most surely have been found wanting to 
his country in her hour of agony and struggle. Neither with 
tongue, nor purse, nor hand, would he have aided the most in- 
spiring cause, that ever appealed to a magnanimous breast. 
The same cast of character, which makes one incapable of 
feeling an absorbing emotion, makes him incapable of heroic 
efforts and heroic sacrifices. He who cannot forget himself 
in admiring true greatness, can never be great, and the pow- 
er of justly appreciating and heartily reverencing exalted merit, 
is, in itself, an unequivocal sign of a noble nature. 

We celebrate this day from a sense of the duty we owe to 
ourselves as well as our fathers, and because the quality of 
gratitude, like that of mercy, is twice blessed — it blesses 
those that give, as well as those that take. We celebrate it 
in obedience to that beautiful and ennobling principle of human 
nature, which so indissolubly connects the present with the 
past, the generation that is with the generations that have been, 
and which makes the individual man feel that his father's 
g\;ave is holy ground, and through the successive periods of 



life, binds liis heart, wilh increasing strenglli of affection, to 
tlie home of his childliood. We have stolen an hour from 
the thick press of every-day engagements, and the cares of 
common hfe, to keep a high festival of commemoration — te 
call up the shade of the past — and to gain that moral power 
which springs from " backward looking thoughts." 

Though this day is the common property of the nation, it 
is the peculiar privilege and duty of the citizens of Boston 
to hold it in fresh remembrance. We claim a large share in 
the glory which it sheds upon the whole American name. 
From the moment that the fatal scheme of raising a revenue 
in the colonies first dawned upon the minds of the British 
ministry and the prophetic sense of patriotism snuffed the ap- 
proach of tyranny in the tainted Eastern breeze, till the last 
argument of the mother country was addressed to her erring 
<5hild, by the throat of the musket, upon the plains of Lex- 
ington, the history of Boston is almost identical with the his- 
tory of our liberty. Here was the central point, at once of 
oppression and resistance — here was the angry heart of Free- 
dom, whence its quick, eager pulsations were transmitted 
through, and felt in all the veins and arteiies of the body poli- 
tic. Our daily walks carry us by the most interesting memo- 
rials of those stirring times. It was in the Old State House 
that James Otis delivered his memorable speech against Writs 
of Assistance, which breathed into the nation, the breath of 
indignant and resisting life. The walls of this church, if 
they could speak, might tell us of the day, when the hoof of 
the war horse insultingly rang in this holy place of the Lord 
and the coarse jest and loose song of the soldier was heard 
here, instead of the voice of thanksgiving and the hymn of 
praise. In Faneuil Hall, whose roof has so often resounded 
with eloquent voices and the deep thunders of popular ap- 
plause, the inhabitants were accustomed to meet together, as 
each new sign of danger glared from the troubled sky, to take 
counsel of each other and to strengthen one another's hearts 
and hands. From these town meetings — ^^these pure demo- 
cracies — conducted with the decency and good order of a 



8 

session of the Roman senate — there went forth memorials, 
resolutions and remonstrances, all breathing the sternest and 
fiercest spirit of liberty, clothed in the bold, yet carefully 
weighed language of men, who laid down no proposition that 
they were not ready to maintain with their bodies, at the can- 
non's mouth. Then and there they were wont to hang upon 
the lips of Otis and Adams and Quincy, who poured out their 
patriot souls in no cheap, frothy declamations, but in mighty 
words of truth and power — deep-freighted with political wis- 
dom — the fruit of painful study and anxious meditation, and 
uttered with those tongues of flame, caught from the inspira- 
tion which great occasions always supply to great and good 
men. Ours is the mournful story of the State street massa- 
cre — ours the thrilling tale of the destruction of the tea — 
two incidents which, in ordinary cases, however religiously 
they might have been preserved by tradition, as matters of 
strong local interest, would hardly have formed a part of the 
great record of history, had not a wise Providence elevated 
them into dignity and importance, by making them prominent 
points in one of the most stately processions of events that 
ever passed before the eyes of an admiring world. The town 
of Boston too, was honored by being singled out as the mark 
at which the lightnings of ministerial vengeance were chiefly 
aimed. Regiment after regiment was stationed here, till the 
streets swarmed with scarlet uniforms, and the soldiers out- 
numbered the male inhabitants. The effect of this ill advised 
step, upon men whom all the armies of England could not have 
awed into silence, shewed the short sighted policy of those 
who take counsel of their passions, for the soldiers in point 
of fact, kindled the flames they were sent to extinguish, and 
made the rebellion they were sent to find. In the debates in 
the British parliament on the Boston port bill. Lord North 
remarked, that " Boston had been ringleader in all the riots, 
and had at all times shewn a desire of seeing the laws of 
Great Britain attempted in vain in the colony of Massachu- 
setts Bay * * * *. Boston alone was to blame for having 
set this example, and therefore Boston ought to be the principal 



9 

object of our attention for punishment. " One of the members 
observed that he was of opinion " that the town of Boston 
ought to be knocked about their ears and destroyed : Delen- 
da est Carthago ; I am of opinion that you will never meet 
with that proper obedience to the laws of this country, until 
you destroy that nest of locusts." The ministry seem to 
have been of somewhat the same opinion with this benevolent 
gentleman, though they preferred the slow process of linger- 
ing decay to the speedier mercy of the battering cannon — for 
by that atrocious bill, the bread was taken out of the mouths 
of three quarters of the inhabitants of the town, and the axe 
was laid to the root, not of its prosperity, but of its existence. 
The mention of the troops who were quartered here, suggests 
an instance of patriotic feeling in that sex, the members of 
which, during our whole Revolutionary struggle, in no respect 
fell behind their sons and husbands and fathers, either in the 
amount of sacrifices exacted of them, or in the cheerfulness 
with which they were made, and wlio, in their quiet homes, 
displayed the same lofty and heroic traits of character, which 
presided over our cabinets and guided our armies. The 
British officers, weary of their monotonous life and of the cold 
looks of suspicion and distrust that every where greeted them, 
on one occasion, attempted to amuse themselves and gain the 
favor of the people, by giving them a ball in a style of unusu- 
al splendor, invitations to which were liberally extended to 
the respectable females of the place, without any distinction 
of politics, but, out of the immediate circle of the officers 
themselves and the various official representatives of the 
mother country, none could be found to accept them, in spite 
of the attractions of dazzling uniforms, fine music and agree- 
able partners. Notwithstanding the most active canvassing 
and recruiting in the neighboring towns, the brilliant assembly 
was graced by so few representatives of the fairer half of 
creation, that a writer of the day sarcastically remarked that 
the most precise puritan could not have accused them of the 
sin of mixed dancing. Honor to th^pje noble minded women of 
Boston, who were too high spirited to receive attentions at 



10 

the hands of tlie enemies of liberty, and too patriotic to join 
in light hearted festivity while their country was in mourning. 
As a proof, at once of the interest which was felt abroad in 
the cause of American liberty and of the prominent part 
which this town was generally supposed to have taken in as- 
serting it, a game of cards was invented at the court of Louis 
XVI. about the time of our revolution, and speedily became 
very fashionable at the capitals and watering places of Europe, 
which was called Boston, in honor of a small provincial town 
in a remote corner of the globe, which, probably nine out of 
ten of those who were in the habit of playing the game, could 
not have pointed out, on the map. Have we not then, with 
these domestic recollections — these fireside traditions — just 
cause for feeling a local as well as a national pride, on this 
day. Ere our bosoms can grow insensible to it, we must 
have degenerated most sadly from the generous stock from 
which we are sprung. Though its memory should fade in 
other hearts, let it ever remain green and fresh in ours. Let 
us be faithful even amid faithless found. Here was the flame 
of liberty kindled — at first a small, faint, trembling light — till 
waxing broader and higher, it finally wrapped the whole con- 
tinent in its vast blaze, flashed across the Atlantic and shook 
its red banner over startled Europe. If that flame is ever to 
go out, and leave the world in hopeless gloom, may its last, 
dying gleams illumine the spot of its birth. 

Let us not struggle against — let us yield to the rushing 
tide of feeling, which, on this day, bears away our hearts. It 
has its origin in the strength, not the weakness of our nature. 
It is good for us to feel strongly, if we also feel justly. Let 
us not be afraid of enthusiasm — our fathers themselves were 
enthusiasts of a noble stamp and were governed in all things, 
by that lofty and uncalculating devotion to principle which 
vulgar minds view with ridicule or distrust. We cannot too 
often go back to the old times or dwell too fondly upon them. 
We may well feel proud, that we can find in our own annals, 
the most admirable models of every public and private virtue. 
Viewing the heroes and statesmen of the revolution as a body, 



11 

we may safely pronounce that there are no men like them on 
record. From the darkness of the past there shine out indi- 
vidual stars of " purest ray serene" to guide and cheer the 
pilgrim of life, but no where, but in our own sky, is seen so 
brilliant a constellation of kindred lights. We are so young 
a people and our situation is so remote, that the great men of 
the old world and of earlier ages seem to us like shadows and 
abstractions, but, so intimately are we connected with the 
great names in our own history and so short is the interval 
that separates us from them, tliat we have the most vivid 
sense of their actual presence. They do not appear to us 
dimly gleaming through the mists of tradition, nor do their 
sober virtues borrow any coloring from the warm hues of poe- 
try and romance. We see them face to face, in the open 
day -light of truth. Fiction is indeed abashed in their presence 
and essays in vain to pourtray the grand and simple elements 
that make up their characters. We admire not only the height, 
but the symmetry of their moral and intellectual stature. We 
do not see a few qualities, growing up to an extraordinary 
height and vigor, while others, equally essential to the perfect 
man, wither and pine in their shade. Their bravery was 
neither that animal courage which springs from physical or- 
ganization nor the iron insensibility of the hardened veteran. 
It was the calm, deliberate valor of thinking men, who were 
fighting for every thing that gladdens and dignifies life — and, 
by their swords, winning the, more secure possession, the 
more full enjoyment of the blessings of peace. The enthusi- 
asm which possessed them was like the flame which the He- 
brew shepherd saw upon Mount Horeb — it burned but it 
did not consume. It gave a stronger grasp to their good 
sense, a keener glance to their sagacity — a new light to their 
judgment. They were no hot-headed creatures of impulse^ 
plunging blindly into a war of which they had not counted the 
cost. They knew well what winged lightning — what " iron 
sleet of arrowy shower" must break upon their heads from 
the dark clouds of battle before the rainbow of peace could 
be painted upon their retiring skirts, but they did not cower 



12 

from the blast nor shrink from the storm. They knew the 
great price at which Freedom was to be prnxhased and they 
were ready to pay it. The spirit of hope and faith which 
filled them, made all exertions light, all sacrifices easy. It was 
not confined to statesmen and soldiers, but it pervaded the 
whole mass of society, as the atmosphere encircles and per- 
vades the material globe, and glowed in every household like 
the domestic fire upon the hearth. It bade wives and mothers 
suppress the natural tears with which they sent out their hus- 
bands and sons to fight the battles of freedom and gave them 
strength to endure the heart-sickness of hope deferred, through 
the long watches of expectation, when the rustle of every leaf 
made them start, lest it might be the footstep of a messenger 
with evil tidings from the camp. Every where, it produced 
tlie same effects — every where, it worked the same miracles. 
By its magic efficacy, toil was cheated of its weariness, dan- 
ger lost its terrors, cold and hunger their bitterness, wounds 
their smart and death its sting. 

Lavish as has been the praise bestowed upon the men of 
the revolution, the consistency of their characters — the 
thoroughness of their good qualities, have hardly been suffi- 
ciently appreciated. They were made of pure, unalloyed 
gold, — sound to the core — unblemished in the last recesses 
of the mind. The magnitude of their services during the war, 
makes us forget the subsequently contracted debt of gratitude 
which we owe them, and especially, for the dignity and firm- 
ness with which they remained at their posts, and sustained 
their own spirits and the spirits of the country, during that 
gloomy period in our history, between the peace of 1783 and 
the adoption of the Federal constitution, a period when we 
were in more real danger and when there would have been 
more excuse for despair, than when the enemies' fleets were 
overshadowing our coasts and their armies covering our land. 
The fair fruits of peace seemed to have turned to ashes in our 
grasp. The weight of public debt, which lay like an incubus 
upon the connnunity, was aggravated by the pressure of 
individual embarrassment. The ships \vere rotting at the 



13 

wharves — mechanics were without employment and without 
bread — grass was growing in the streets of cities and the 
silence of the churchyard reigned over the busy marts and 
exchanges of commerce. The pulse of national life had ap- 
parently stopped beating, and the ship of state, which had 
weathered many storms, appeared ready to go down, upon a 
smooth sea and beneath blue skies. Here was a call for high- 
er qualities than those of the mere soldier — for virtues which 
war and battles could not teach — for adamantine fortitude, 
for undying hope, for love vast as eternity and stronger than 
death, for faith deep-anchored and firm as that Rock of Ages 
on which alone it could rest. The character of man is al- 
ways more severely tried in situations which require passive, 
than in those which require active virtues. The gallant sol- 
dier, who casts himself so freely upon the stormy waves of 
battle, when the brain reels and the heart burns with its stir- 
ring sights and sounds, is often found sadly deficient in those 
calm virtues which bloom "along the cool, sequestered vale" of 
civic life. It was not so vi^ith the men of the revolution. The 
same dignity of mind and elevation of character which gave 
them the power to do, gave them also the power to bear and 
to suffer. 

The formation of a new government also, under cir- 
cumstances of the time, required the same commanding 
moral and intellectual superiority. To combine the jarring 
and confused elements of so troubled a chaos into a beautiful 
and substantial fabric of social order, demanded, not only 
minds of a high rank, meditative, sagacious and practical — 
rich in the garnered harvests of study, experience and obser- 
vation — but characters cast in Nature's noblest, most heroic 
mould — a "temperate will" a spirit of self-sacrifice, pa- 
tience, gentleness, mutual forbearance, a readiness to yield 
occasionally — to give up some favorite points — to concili- 
ate by reasonable concessions, a respect not only, for one 
another's feelings, but for one another's prejudices and a mag- 
nanimous disdain of every thing low, sordid and selfish. No 
weight of argument, no splendor of eloquence could have in- 
2 



14 

duced the i^eople to adopt the Constitution, if they had not 
had that confidence in the moti\es and characters of its framers 
and advocates, which gave to their simple advice and plain 
statements all the force of logic — all the persuasion of rhetoric. 
It is our duty to celebrate this day, not merely by idle 
pomp, vain display, and tumultuous rejoicing — by new vari- 
ations on the old theme of self-glorification and by devising 
fresh stimulants to quicken the dull sense of a surfeited na- 
tional vanity — but in a manner worthy of the great men and 
the great principles with which it is associated — by high pur- 
poses and magnanimous resolves, by deeper gratitude and 
loftier faith, by a sterner sense of national honor and a warm- 
er flow of patriotic sensibility. Let us not alone be proud of 
the precious inhei'ilance, of which our hearts and memories 
are the heirs. Let us by a right use of it, prove that we are 
worthy of it. Let not the thrilling recollections of the past 
awaken in us a transient glow of feeling, subsiding at the cold 
approach of low, personal cares, as the delicate hues of sun- 
set fade away and disappear in the increasing darkness of 
night, but let them penetrate our characters, color our whole 
lives, and be felt in the very core of our hearts. Let us not 
be content with that cheap admiration of our fathers, which 
evaporates in a rhetorical flourish. Let us not stop short of 
that higher and more enduring form, which is shewn by the 
unerring test of imitation. Let us, under different circum- 
stances, conform to the same elevated standard of duty, and 
learn the same lesson of self-respect and self-sacrifice. Let 
us strive to bear the trial of prosperity, as well as they did 
that of adversity. By the bitter air of peril and privation, 
they were braced into moral vigor and robustness. Upon 
our heads the storm does not beat. Ours are tlie sunshine of 
happiness and the soft gale of repose. May we not be ener- 
vated by the blessings we enjoy. May we inhale no insidious 
disease in the fragrance and the balm. Let us honor our 
fathers, in the conviction that in so doing, we elevate our- 
selves. The grateful reverence in which we hold them is 
most valuable for the reflected influences, which it sheds upon 



15 

our own cliavaclers. They indeed do not need tlie homage 
of our hearts, or the praises of our hps. They are at rest and 
their works follow them. As their labors were without par- 
allel, so has been their reward. Not only is their memory 
twined round our mountains and are their praises heard in the 
rushing of our streams — not only do their spirits hallow the 
spots where they sleep in glory and in peace — but their 
names are stamped on the broad page of our prosperity, and 
all the delights, privileges and possessions of civilized, social, 
and political life, are their monuments and memorials. The 
unexampled rapidity with which we have passed through the 
successive periods of national growth, patient statistics with 
its slate and pencil toiling after us in vain, springs not only 
from our extraordinary physical advantages, but from the vital 
principle of increase, which they infused into our institutions. 
The sails of our commerce waft their renown us "far as the 
breezes bear, the billows foam." The spires of our churches, 
pointing to the skies into which they have passed, remind us 
to whom we owe the unspeakable blessings of religious free- 
dom, and bid gratitude and devotion, ascend in one mingled 
flame, to Heaven. The glad hum of our industry going up 
from our cities, towns, and villages, swelled by contributions 
from the innumerable occupations and employments of life — 
a sound bespeaking thrift, intelligence, and happiness — is one 
loud and long anthem of praise to the great and good men, 
who were the^instruments, in the hands of God, for crowning 
our horn with plenty and making our cup run over with joy. 
This day reminds us of our duties as well as our blessings. 
Let us not imagine that nothing has been left for us to do, 
because so much has been done by those who have gone be- 
fore us. It is as true of nations as of individuals, that to 
whom much has been given, of them much will be required. 
Liberty is preserved by the same high qualities by which it is 
won, and it slips from the feeble grasp of indolent security. 
If we do not watch and prune the vine which our fathers 
planted, our children will seek in vain upon it, those rich 
clusters, which its youthful luxuriance lavishes upon us. This 



l(i 

is a day sacred to lecling, but not to feeling alone. Little 
would our enthusiasm be worth, if it passed away and left us 
neither wiser nor better. Let us seize the golden moment 
and stamp the images of virtue and patriotism deep upon our 
hearts, while they are yet warm and glowing. No reflecting 
man permits his own birth-day to pass by without some seri- 
ous thoughts — some good resolves — and on this, the birth- 
day of our nation, it becomes us to ponder well our position 
as a people and the duties growing out of it — and to make a 
solemn covenant with ourselves, that we will keep our minds 
and souls ever open to all just and noble and pure influences, 
and thereby build up that inward, self-derived strength, which 
is alone proof against all the shocks and assaults of time. To 
do the work set us by our great Task-master, and to transmit 
to those who come after us, without waste or blemish, the 
precious deposit which we received from such honored 
hands, demand the constant exercise of masculine virtues, 
minds unsubdued by ease, a moral strength that prosperity 
cannot vanquish, "stern self-respect" and the overshadow- 
ing presence of that spirit of the Lord without which there is 
no true Liberty. 

A representative republic like ours, the most compUcated 
and delicate of all forms of government, requires in the peo- 
ple, as elements essential to its existence even, certain high 
personal qualities, which are less and less needed, the nearer 
we approach to a simple despotism. There never was, and 
never will be, a paper government, and the most admirable 
written constitution can never be anything more than an in- 
strument, by means of which, a nation may attain to great- 
ness and happiness. An unprincipled and reckless majority 
will heed its checks and restraints as little as an inflamed 
mob heeds the reading of the riot-act. A corrupt poHtician, 
with a strong party to back him, will find in its provisions 
any power that he wants, and if there be a knot too hard for 
construction to untie, he will boldly cut it with the sword of 
prerogative. Let it ever be borne in mind, that Liberty, pre- 
cious as it is, is valuable as a means, not as an end — for its 



17 

results, rather than for its own sake. We look with little 
envy upon the boundless freedom of the naked savage, with a 
province for a hunting-field, because the sober eye of truth 
beholds within that unshackled frame, a dwarfish mind and a 
soul swarming with fierce, animal appetites. Those floating 
palaces, with which the genius of Fulton has peopled our 
rivers and bays, aflbrd an apt illustration of the advantages 
of liberty, wisely employed and judiciously restrained, and of 
its dangers, when entrusted to careless and ignorant hands. 
When we see the stately fabric, cleaving its majestic way in 
a path of foam, " against the wind, against the tide," we ad- 
mire the grand and beautiful results, which spring from the 
subjection of the infinite energies of nature to the mind of 
man ; but, when the reckless engineer forgets or breaks the 
law by which alone, like some potent magician, he makes fire 
and water the vassals of his will, those mighty elements, like 
wild beasts breaking from their cage, exert their power to the 
destruction of man and his works, rending the tough iron like 
paper, tearing up the strong timbers like straws, and carrying 
agony, terror and death in their train. Thus, Liberty be- . 
comes a maddening curse, without the constant, superintend- 
ing presence of a self-derived and self-sustained law. We 
must be worthy of it, before we can make a proper use of it. 
A nation must have attained the full stature of moral man- 
hood, ere it can be allowed to take care of itself. There can 
be no Liberty worth having, without a governing mind and a 
discreet will, and no chartered rights can make a freeman of 
him, who has the sentiments of a slave. Chains do not in- 
deed make the slave, nor the want of them the freeman. He, 
who, in a land of liberty, submits to the rule of his vices and 
passions and wears the iron upon his soul, is the true slave 
not he, whose body the oppressor has cast into a dungeon or 
loaded with fetters. He, who sells himself for the wages of 
corruption, preferring the flesh-pots of an Egyptian bondage 
to " a crust of bread and Liberty," is the meanest and basest 
of slaves. 

The value of our own constitution — an instrument never 



IS 

yet extravagantly praised, not even by a Fourth of July ora- 
tor in the very " agony of his glory" — depends, in a great 
measure, upon the spirit, which we ourselves breathe into its 
dead paragraphs. It is sometimes a matter of discussion, 
whether our institutions are good enough and strong enough 
to last long and wear well. Be assured that the defect, if any 
there be, is not in our institutions, but in ourselves. If the 
great experiment here under trial fail, it will be, not because 
our institutions, are not good enough for us, but because we 
are not good enough for our institutions. It will be, because 
the founders of our government reposed too much confidence 
in the people — because they conniiitted the mistake not un- 
common with great and pure minds, of judging mankind at 
large, by the impulses of their own noble natures, rather than 
by the inferior standard of experience and observation. Forms 
of government are permanent or short-lived, not according as 
they are good or bad, but according as they are well or ill 
adapted to the genius and character of the people, upon whom 
they are imposed or by whom they arc adopted. Indeed, 
there is no such thing as a good or bad government in itself, 
independently of the men for whom it is intended. Some- 
times a people get in advance of their institutions, as we out- 
grew our colonial dependence, and carved out a better system 
for ourselves with our swords, — sometimes they fall behind 
them, as the Romans did, when they passed from the repub- 
lic to the empire. The Pacha of Egypt or the Dictator of 
Paraguay — may fear the bullet of the solitary assassin, but 
not the insulted spirit of their subjects as a body, because 
they know that their necks are fitted to the yoke they wear. 
The lever of physical power meets with little resistance, in 
swaying an inert mass of ignorance. Our written constitu- 
tions and representative assemblies would be as useless to the 
crouching Copt or trembling Arab, as books in the learned 
languages or delicate philosophical instruments. Take the 
world through, it will be found that every nation has about as 
good a government as it deserves. History swarms with in- 
stances in proof of these elementary truths. We need not go 



19 

to France and point to those monstrous abortions of govern- 
ment, which, ia the progress of her revolution, were begotten 
by pohtical ignorance upon a cloud of metaphysics, succeed- 
ing each other as rapidly as the slides of a magic lantern, till 
the spirit of the people found its proper exponent in the ge- 
nius of that extraordinary man, whose dazzling career makes 
all the wonders of romance seem tame and vapid. We may 
find them exemplified most strikingly in the history of a por- 
tion of our own country and in the labors of a philosopher 
"all-compact" of vigorous English sense — I mean the 
illustrious John Locke, who, in 1669 at the request of Lord 
Ashley, drew up a constitution for the Proprietary govern- 
ment of South Carolina, which, from its repugnancy to 
the tastes, feelings and opinions of the colonists, was so sig- 
nal a failure and was, from necessity, abandoned so soon, as 
to afford the strongest evidence of the incapacity of the wisest 
of men for legislating, in their closets, for the eager, impetu- 
ous crowds, that dwell in the out-of-door world and are hurry- 
ing to and fro, along the great thoroughfare of life. Take also 
the case of that singular misnomer, the commonwealth of 
England, which never had any hold upon the affections of the 
people. While Oliver Cromwell lived, to wield the sceptre 
of a power, commensurate in extent with his own command- 
ing genius, it mattered little what name was given to that, 
which was, in fact, the most absolute of monarchies. But 
when the mighty magician died, the elements of popular feel- 
ing, which he had ruled by his potent word, resumed their 
natural sway — the name of commonwealth disappeared like a 
vapor, — and Charles was carried, by acclamation to the 
throne of his fathers, to shew his subjects to how little pur- 
pose he had studied the lessons of adversity. 

The great and wise men who framed our constitution, were 
required to make a government which should not only look 
well on paper, but which should recommend itself to the feel- 
' ings and habits of their constituents, and by these means, se- 
cure its own continuance and stability. In performing their 
weighty task, they assumed as a point of departure, the ex- 



20 

istence of certain traits of mind and character in that people, 
whose whole temporal interest and happiness hung upon the 
issue of their deliberations. Some known qualities were given 
to them, without which they could not have proceeded a step, 
in the working out of their great political problem. This will 
strike the most superficial reader of that constitution — which, 
when we consider its own intrinsic excellence and its un- 
bounded and ever-increasing sphere of influence — may be 
pronounced without any exaggeration, the most valuable pre- 
sent ever conferred by one set of men upon another. Every 
one for instance, will observe that this form of government 
could never have been intended for a grossly ignorant people, 
who are no more capable of being intrusted with so much 
power, as is conferred upon us by that instrument, than mad- 
men are with torches, or children with edge-tools. Equal- 
ly easy is it to perceive, that such a constitution could never 
have been meant for a corrupt and profligate people, who 
would draw the elements of destruction from the large discre- 
tion given to us. Vice is essentially a destructive, and virtue 
a conservative principle. The evil passions of men arc con- 
stantly struggling against, warring with and repelling each 
other. Bad men are only kept together by the strong princi- 
ple of fear. No where is there so iron a discipline, so des- 
potic authority, as among gangs of robbers and the crews of 
pirate-ships. With them there is but one crime, that of diso- 
bedience — and one punishment, that of death. Without go- 
ing so far as to declare, that every man m a republic should 
be virtuous and intelligent, there must, to say the least, be a 
great preponderance of virtue and intelligence. As that is 
the highest and worthiest of all forms- of government, so must 
its citizens be men of the highest order. 

The primal truth, which we are to write upon the borders 
of our garments and wear as a frontlet between our eyes, is, 
that our prosperity depends, not upon lifeless systems and writ- 
ten rules, which are manufactured as easily as the parchment 
upon which they are engrossed, but upon that living principle 
of growth and stability in the nation at large, which is a sort 



21 

of galaxy, composed of the innumerable and blended lights of 
private virtue-— to the formation of which, every thing con- 
tributes, which acts favorably upon the character of the indi- 
vidual man, the endearing charities of home, the sweet influ- 
ences of domestic life, the reading of good books, the 
counsels of wise teachers, the cheering looks and words of 
faithful friends, the hopes and promises of rehgion. This 
is no new or startling proposition. The mind assents to it 
without hesitation, but that is not enough. We must carve 
it deep upon the tablets of the heart. We must take it from 
the cold regions of speculation and warm it into active and 
fruitful life, by keeping it close pressed to our business and 
bosoms. We must give it a place, in that storehouse of motives 
from which we draw for daily and hourly use. It is susceptible 
of illustration in an infinite variety of ways. It is for instance, 
essential to the permanence of every government, that there 
should be in the people a spirit of reverence — a readiness to 
respect every thing respectable, to venerate every thing ven- 
erable. This principle, in other countries is created and sus- 
tained by arguments addressed to the senses and the imagina- 
tion, which we have not at command. The flame of loyalty 
is kept ahve by the reflected splendor of a court. The stars 
and garters of a nobility dazzle even the eye of reason and be- 
wilder its inquiring gaze. Justice has her ample robes, her 
stately retinues, her visible terrors. Institutions of doubtful 
expediency, to say the least, are guarded by the mighty force 
of prescription and sanctified by the " awful hoar of innumer- 
able ages." The government is a thing apart from and above 
the people — to which they have been always accustomed to 
look up with worshipful regard — and they cling round its 
knees with the blind reverence and instinctive trust of child- 
ren. It appeals to their taste, their pride, their gratitude, 
their sensibility, by the splendor of architecture, by the mute 
eloquence of painting and sculpture, by vast libraries, by lib- 
erally-endowed scientific, literary and charitable institutions. 
The religious principle is fed by the pomp of a gorgeous 
hierarchy, by the splendor of imposing ceremonies, by choral 
3 



22 

music thai seems to realize the harmonies of Heaven, by 
cathedrals, dim with the majesty of centuries, beneath whose 
" high-embowed roof" and mid whose " sumptuous aisles," 
God appears, to the rapt eye of devotion, almost to assume a 
visible presence. This whole class of important influences rs 
denied to us. The youth of our country and the stern genius 
of utility, by whose iron sceptre we are swayed, are unfavor- 
able to this unbought, spontaneous reverence. The State is 
our agent and we call it to strict account for every dollar that 
it spends. Every thing is plain, homely and useful. Patri- 
otism has no Westminster Abbey and religion no St. Pauls. 
We are addressed in language which can be understood only 
by the reason. If we honor our government, it must be be- 
cause it has such high, intrinsic claims upon our regard — if 
we respect our institutions, it must be from a deep sense of 
their substantial and innate value. As there are fewer types 
and symbols to dazzle the senses and kindle the imagination, 
we must keep the mind more familiar with the great ideas 
which they represent. We must bow with more implicit sub- 
mission to the throne of reason, since we have cast off all in- 
ferior allegiance. 

A well-known English traveller in our country remarks 
upon the fact, that our judges do not wear wigs and gowns 
as being, in his eyes, a defect in our judiciary system. 1 
cite this observation simply for the sake of the illustration 
which it affords. The man who is inclined to pay more 
respect to the decrees of a judge in a scarlet robe with 
a wig of curled horse-hair upon his head, than of one in a 
plain coat and wearing his natural hair, is not qualified to be 
the citizen of a sober republic. We must reverence our 
judges as the living representatives of that Law, " whose 
voice is the harmony of worlds" and of that Justice, which is 
the foundation of the throne of God. In the same spirit, we 
must not think of our rulers and governors, with the vulgar 
feeling that they derive all their rank and authority from us 
and that they are made and unmade by our votes — we must 
behold in them, the embodied presence of the majesty and ex- 



22 

•ceHency of the nation and the expression of the popular will, 
that vast and unseen power, which gives its support alike to 
the president's chair and the monarch's throne and without 
which, the crown of the latter is a childish bauble and his 
sceptre a golden plaything. 

In our government we have agreed to dispense with the 
principle of fear. As we have nothing more imposing than 
the buttons on a marshal's coat, so we have nothing more for- 
midable than a file of marines on a recruiting service. Other 
governments avail themselves largely of it. The thrones of 
Europe are fenced about by the bristling bayonets of a stand- 
ing army. In addition to this obvious source of power and 
instrument of terror, security is sought by various expedients. 
The traveller and his passport are strictly examined at the 
frontiers of states, the heavy hand of the police is upon every 
man's shoulder and the penetrating glance of a strict system 
of espionage is over all his words and works. In some parts 
of the old world, a man has the same sort of uneasy feeling, 
in the consciousness that the government is constantly watch- 
ing his motions, that children sometimes experience, in ob- 
serving that the eyes of a portrait follow them through every 
part of the room. It is impossible to estimate the amount of 
strength derived from these sources and the increased difficul- 
ty of overturning even an unpopular government thus offen- 
sively and defensively armed. We, of course, know notliing 
of these things except from what we have almost incredulous- 
ly read. Our government is constructed on a strict let-alone 
principle and its pressure is as light as that of the air. But it 
is evident, that the absence of these galling restraints is a bene- 
fit, only the supposition that their place is occupied by some- 
thing higher and better. We must supply to ourselves and 
from within, that law and impulse, which make them unneces- 
sary. Coercion is degrading only to him who does not need 
it. If we have no armed sentinels patrolling our streets and 
no spies in the bar-rooms of our taverns, it is because it is 
taken for granted that every good citizen is a pohce officer 
and that he keeps in his own conscience, an unslumbering 



24 

spy upon his purposes and his actions. That all forms of 
popular violence assume a peculiarly appalling aspect in a 
country like ours, is a truth which needs not to be confirmed 
by the startling voice of experience. It is an evil against 
which we are not forewarned, consequently not forearmed. 
During some of the popular tumults in England a few years 
since, which made the services of the military essential to 
preserve order, it was rumored that the soldiers themselves 
were growing disaffected and it w^as asked with much wit and 
meaning, " what will the government do if their extinguishers 
should take fire" ? In this country, it may be asked with 
deep concern, what are we to do, wdio have no extinguishers ? 
Our best rights and privileges have no protection but the 
broad shield of public opinion — if that be broken, Liberty 
will fall upon her own sword. Sad indeed will be our lot, if 
good sense, intelligence and weight of character lend a more 
systematic energy to the lawless violence of a mob and increase 
its wild rage by the infusion of a deeper, darker, more sus- 
tained excitement — if the walls and barriers of our defence 
swell with their own blazing materials, the terrors of that con- 
flagration, whose progress they were erected to stay. He, 
who on any pretence, directly or indirectly aids and abets a 
body of reckless and unthinking men in their attempts to tram- 
ple on the majesty of the law, is false to his trust as a citizen 
of the republic and stands convicted, either of gross want of 
principle or gross want of reflection. 

Time permits me to mention but one other personal ingre- 
dient necessary in the composition of our prosperity. Popu- 
lar institutions like ours, can derive their efiiciency and life- 
blood from no other source than the warm and unbroken in- 
terest felt in them by the people. Where the men are the 
subjects of a state and not the state itself, they may interest 
themselves as little as they please in their governments, since 
the only duty required of them is obedience, but in this mat- 
ter, we have no right of choice. As our rulers are our trus- 
tees, not our guardians, appointed by and responsible to our- 
selves, we must keep a good watch over our own interests in 



on 



their hands. In short, we must be warmed by the divine 
glow of patriotism, — tliat noble word which has been so 
abused and perverted and apphed to all sorts of party madness 
and sectional selfishness, that men seem shy of naming it and 
we hardly find it except in the themes of school-boys. But, 
whatever becomes of the word we cannot dispense with the 
feeling, for without it, no free people ever became a great 
people. A feeling, do I say, it is or ought to be a principle, 
striking its roots deep and far into the national character. It 
should dwell in every man's heart. It should mingle with the 
hopes of youth, the cares and toils of manhood and the recol- 
lections of old age. It should heighten the enjoyment of hap- 
piness and abate the sharpness of suffering. We should not 
limit our regards to those who vote on our side and shout and 
stamp at the same caucuses. We should not bestow upon 
our common country the meagre grudgingly-yielded tithe of 
our afFections, while their full luxuriance is poured out upon 
our own State or our own Section. Let not rivers and 
mountains and geographical divisions bound our sympathies. 
In all domestic institutions and family jars, we must cherish 
that feeling, which, in a foreign land, thrills the frame and suf- 
fuses the eyes of the American citizen, as he sees the well- 
known stars and stripes floating upon the breeze — not the 
symbol of a state — not the badge of a section, but with the 
dignity and honor and power of the whole country reposing in 
its ample folds. Let us not admit the common fallacy, which 
associates the labors and sacrifices of patriotism, exclusively 
with a state of war. Peace needs its sentinels and security its 
watch-towers. Dangei- wakes into active life a thousand slum- 
bering energies — and perils, which are foreseen, cease to be 
formidable. In the unguarded hours of repose, when we dream 
of no evil, destruction invades both men and nations. It was 
in the security of sleep the strong man of Israel lost his invin- 
cible locks and a feeble woman conquered the champion, whose 
single arm was a match for all the armies of the uncircuracis- 
ed. Should the old times come back to us, the old spirit 
would come with them. Should some chasm of ruin yawn 



26 

for our beloved country, I know well that every little village 
would send forth its Curtius to close it up with the costly of- 
fering of his life, and should our destiny demand a new Ther- 
mopylae, not three hundred, but three hundred times three 
hundred, would start up to meet death in the mountain-pass. 
Our country does not require us to die for her. She asks of 
us a higher, harder sacrifice, to live for her. She bids us con- 
sider her claims paramount, not only to the charms of ease 
and the allurements of pleasure, but to the engrossing demands 
of business, the glitter of wealth and the excitements of ambi- 
tion. She calls upon the wise and good to rescue her from 
the hands of the selfish demagogues that make politics a 
trade — a vampire-brood that would fain fill their veins 
with her life-blood. She entreats us to keep her sweet 
and pleasant image ever in our minds, as a pure and pow- 
erful talisman against all assaults of evil principle, as a 
good son calls up the form of a venerable parent to succour his 
fainting and exhausted virtue. She commands our men of 
letters to forsake the worship of false, foreign gods and lay 
the precious gifts of their genius upon her altar. She bids 
the fathers and mothers of our land remember how large an 
interest she has in their blooming treasures and train them up 
in such a way, that she may set them with pride and joy, as 
living jewels, in her coronet. She calls upon us, one and all, 
to make her " the ocean to the river of our thoughts" and to 
pour out " our hearts like water, to swell the tide, that bears 
her on to glory." 

My friends, on this day, thoughts infinite and various, strug- 
gle for admittance into the mind. Memories and anticipa- 
tions throng upon us in crowds. The present hour seems but 
a narrow isthmus between two vast continents of the past and 
the future. The exulting sense, with which our hearts swell, in 
the consciousness of what we are and we possess, gradually 
deepens into seriousness as we look before and behind, and 
reflect upon our golden opportunities, the vast weight of our 
responsibility, our solemn duties, the animating motives that 
address us and the cloud of witnesses by which we are en- 



21 

compassed. From the graves of those who have gone before 
us there breathes a voice which bids us be Hke them, faith- 
ful and firm. It is told of the late Lord Byron, that when a 
boy, he prevented his companions from tearing down their 
school-room by shewing them the names of their fathers upon 
Its walls. Let us not be less wise, less grateful than school- 
boys. Let us acknowledge the generous impulse that touch- 
ed them. As it forbade them to destroy, so let it stimulate 
us to preserve. Remember that this majestic fabric of so- 
cial order, which shelters us, is written, over and over, in let- 
ters of living light, with the names of our fathers. Remem- 
ber what blood flows in our veins. Remember what noble 
hearts have throbbed, what pure hands have toiled for us. 
Remember with what struggles, what sacrifices, what anxious 
watchings, what magnanimous self-conquests, our blessings 
were won. Remember the massive foundations of manly vir- 
tue, in which our institutions were laid. Remember with 
what fervent prayers, the blessing of the God of our fathers 
has been invoked upon our heads. 

Nor are all our motives and warnings the growth of our own 
soil, nor are the famihar voices of our own kindred the only 
ones, whose moving accents we hear. We are not insulated 
in time or space. Strong ties connect us with other lands 
and past ages. The good wishes of loving hearts have fol- 
lowed us, the youngest and most adventurous child of the hu- 
man family, to this our world of promise. Thousands are 
at this moment, silently watching the star of hope that flames 
in our sky, and as it ascends higher and sparkles more bright- 
ly, they derive from its beams, strength to endure, till the day- 
spring of Liberty shall visit them. Sublime warnings — sol- 
emn tones come to us from the dim and awful past — a dirge- 
like sound, hke the voice of the midnight wind sighing through 
the broken arches of some vast ruin. History, weary of her 
long catalogue of crime and oppression and suffering, seems 
imploring us, that she may not be doomed to write the pages 
that record our fortunes, in bloody characters and with stream- 
ing eyes. When we see how much misery has sprung from 



28 

unnatural but deeply-planted systems, how by their agency 
men's faces have gathered blackness against each other, and 
the serpent's teeth of strife have been sown in ihe furrows of 
the heart — how many noble spirits have madly and unavail- 
ingly dashed out their lives against the iron bars of their 
strength — what powers, affections and virtues have withered 
and died in the poisonous shade which they cast — we cannot 
but hope and trust that there maybe here an asylum, in which 
outraged, insulted, bleeding humanity may find repose and 
balm — that despairing philanthropy may see here a new world 
of successful action, in the full development of our great princi- 
ple of social brotherhood, which bids us respect, not the sol- 
dier, the noble, the priest, but the man, with the same blood 
in his veins, the same joys and sorrows, hopes and fears 
peopling the world of his breast, lying down in the same 
grave, waking to the same immortality. When we observe 
how often by means of unjust laws proceeding from a con- 
tempt of, or indifference to the less favored classes, misfor- 
tune has been treated as a crime and the whole seem to have 
entered into a remorseless conspiracy against the poor indi- 
vidual, we have a right to indulge the expectation, that under 
the influence of a better dispensation, that mighty abstraction. 
Society, will no longer glare upon her erring children with 
stern, stepmother aspect, but will open wide the arms of 
maternal forgiveness to receive the returning prodigal, and in- 
vite him to weep away his shame and remorse upon her lov- 
ing and sympathizing bosom. 

Let no one accuse me of seeing wild visions and dreaming 
impossible dreams. I am only stating what may be done, not 
what will be done. We may most shamefully betray the trust 
reposed in us — we may most miserably defeat the fond hopes 
entertained of us. We may become the scorn of tyrants and 
the jest of slaves. From our fate, oppression may assume 
a bolder front of insolence and its victims sink into a dark- 
er despair. In that event how unspeakable will be our dis- 
grace — with what weight of mountains will the infamy lie 
upon our souls. The gulf of our ruin will be as deep, as the 



29 



ecu.,, .,, '.,e. fori:;;,;,:'- r:':?;, o?::t:::: 

b^ken, us scattered fragments presenting every form of nis- 
ruh. frotn the widest anarchy to the ,„ost ru.hfess despot t^ 
our "sod drenched wnh fraternal blood," the life if man 
str.pped of ,ts grace and dignity, the prizes of honor .one a, d 
vtrtne <„.orced fron, half its encouragements and s.„^::,;- 
these are glootny p,etures, which I wonid not invite your 

ot he vvatn.ng lessons we may draw from then,. Re,„en,her 
tha we can have none of those consolations, whicl, sustain the 

CO n; O T"™ °"'' "" "'"^'""-''' "-shmne. of his 
counl.y. Our Rome cannot fall and we l,o innocent. No 
conqueror w,l chain us to the car of his triuntph - no count- 
ess swarm of Huns and Goths will bury ,h„ „,en,orials and 
^opines of cmhzed life beneath a hving tide of barbarism. 
Our own selfishness, our own neglect, our own passions, and 
our own vces w,ll furni.,h the elements of our destruction. 
W,tb our own hands we shall tear down the stately edifice of 
om^glory. We shall die by self-inflicted wounds 

thmk of fadure, d.shonor and despair. On this day, we will 
not a „„t the possibility of being untrue to our fat ,ers a,d 
ourselves We w,Il elevate our minds to the contemplation 
of our h,gb duties and the great trust comnntted to us We 
wdl resolve to lay the foundations of our prosperity on tl>at 
oek of pnvate vtrtne, which cannot be shaken, until the 

brea-tf shall ^°™V™''f- "'■'= '"'"''''•''i- From our own 
biea^ts shall flow the sahent springs of national incease. 

1 hen our success, our happiness, our glory will be as inevitable 

as the inferences of mathematics. We may calndy s.nile a, 

all the croaktngs of all the ravens, whether of native or foreign 

breed. The whole will not grow weak by the increase of in 

parts Our growth will be like that of the mountain oak 

whtch strikes its roots more deeply into the soil and clings to 

■t w.th a closer grasp, as its lofty head is exahed and its broad 

4. 



30 

arms siietclied out. The loud burst of joy and gratitude, 
which is on this day breaking from the full hearts of a mighty 
people, will never cease to be heard. No chasms of sullen 
silence will interrupt its course — no discordant notes of sec- 
tional madness mar the general harmony. Year after year 
will increase it, by tributes from now unpeopled solitudes. 
The farthest West shall hear it and rejoice — the Oregon 
shall swell it with the voice of its waters — the Rocky moun- 
tains shall fling back the glad sound from their snowy scalps. 






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